The Other Side of Kazaana

A/N One, thanks for all the reviews. I’m really thrilled that ya’ll are enjoying this so much, even with the dark bits thrown in here and there. Speaking of which…Remember when I said the darkest part was behind us? Ummmmmmm, ahem…can I take that back ??

WARNING: DARK ANGST at the end of the chapter, involving the ronin. There will be a N/C LEMON with a MINOR (no, not Shippou), and it’s short, but nasty. Not a sexy scene in the slightest.

As there’s some major plot involved in it, I’m offering this option: if you just don’t think you can read it, stop reading as soon as you hit the ronin’s POV at the END, then review and let me know. That way, I’ll put a summary in the next chapter author’s note or something, so you’ll at least have the plot idea.


Chapter 14 – Miroku’s Knowledge

Ronin Miroku held onto the bar above his head, eyes blank and self-absorbed even as his body grunted periodically to the sound of Naraku’s whip. Blood ran sluggishly down his back, unnoticed.

He replayed Naraku’s words in his head, thinking carefully as the hanyou bled his body. Naraku was getting too frantic over his little monk. The ronin could see the fanaticism and blood lust in his eyes growing stronger each time he spoke of interrogating the other Miroku. Naraku wanted to know what had happened in the other world. He wanted to know what of his plots had worked, what had failed, and how, exactly, he’d died. The ronin could tell, however, that at this point, his little pretty wasn’t expected to survive the questioning.

He assumed it was largely due to the long delay. As convoluted as Naraku could think, he did rather poorly when he planned for a short resolution and didn’t get it. The ronin was certain that the little monk was going to pay the price for that long delay. It was quite irritating. After all, Naraku had seemed receptive at first to taking Miroku for a toy; leaving him for the ronin to keep, as he’d asked. But by the time Ronin Miroku had returned to Naraku’s stronghold, without a prisoner, Naraku’s mood had become dark and lethal.

The ronin had tested the waters to see if his half-breed master could be brought back from the edge. Now that Inuyasha and the others knew who was after Miroku, the need for stealth was eliminated, after all. All the ronin had to do was create the proper distraction and come down on Inuyasha’s group hard and fast and leave with Miroku. Unfortunately, while Naraku approved of the plan, the ronin could tell that he was still planning on slowly tearing his monk to shreds.

So, he’d let him rant as he disrobed. As usual after any sort of disappointment, he saw Naraku choose one of his heavier whips and the ronin had walked to the bed frame to grasp it carefully, readying himself for the half-breed to begin beating him. He was certain Naraku wouldn’t last long before he took him. He never did when his anger was roused.

He’s planning on killing my pretty, he thought, grunting again as the whip struck.

I don’t believe I’m going to allow that.



Miroku sat in Inuyasha’s lap facing his friends, a faint pink tinge lingering on his cheeks no matter how hard he tried remain calm. It was simply too difficult to ignore the hanyou behind him, as well as the grins he saw hiding behind his friends’ sober faces. Feeling how easy it was for him to start flushing wildly, he thought it would be a long, long time before he could truly cope with the idea that his friends were intimately acquainted with his sexual ‘experiment.’ And now, to make coping yet more difficult, they wanted to talk to him about what had happened with the ronin. He swallowed heavily, trying to think of what he could tell them, and what he could leave out without fear of missing something important. There were some things that were simply to intimate and personal to share with a crowd, frankly.

Inuyasha patted his shoulder as though he sensed Miroku’s distress and the monk smiled slightly even as he groaned at his own weakness. Inuyasha was proving to be an important part of his continued mental health, and he hated how much he had started to rely on him. He had spent the night next to him in the hut again, and Miroku hadn’t been able to fall asleep until the hanyou had shown up. And here he was again, likely unable to even converse with these men and women that he now regarded as friends, except for the presence of the domineering, pushy hanyou behind him. He really needed to find a way to be comfortable with only his own presence for company, or he didn’t think he’d ever completely heal.

Inuyasha’s hand chose that moment to start playing with the hair at the nape of his neck, and he startled as a quivery tingle ran down his spine at the contact.

“Inuyasha, please stop that.” He whispered.

“Mmm? I’m sorry, I couldn’t quite hear you. Could you speak up?”

Looking around at the others who were certain to hear if he raised his voice, he grumbled and resigned his hair to being a play toy for the duration. It wasn’t as though small touches like these hadn’t been happening for months now, anyway. It was simply that he was finding a sexual undertone to it all that he’d thought he’d imagined before. No matter how much he thought about it, he wasn’t really sure whether to be worried about the touching or not. The two most likely scenarios he could come up with were that either Inuyasha was a very physical person who’d happened to have a sexual encounter with Miroku, or he was a lot more experienced than Miroku had ever guessed and he’d been leading up to having sex from the very beginning. The possibility of the latter was disturbing on more than one level. If nothing else, it made him very uncomfortable to think that he might have been willfully seduced.

Sesshoumaru cleared his throat and Miroku froze, slowly calming as Inuyasha continued to gently pull at his hair.

“Inuyasha said that you agreed to talk about what happened, Miroku.” Sesshoumaru said slowly, his voice soft so as not to carry to Rin and Shippou as Jaken kept them occupied a small distance away.

Miroku swallowed and nodded.

“You don’t have to talk about anything you don’t wanna.” Inuyasha said quietly above his head. “But we could really use any information you can give us, to find out what Naraku’s planning. We don’t want something like this to happen again, Miroku.”

“Neither do I.” Miroku said quietly.

“Did the ronin give you any idea what Naraku wanted from you?” Sesshoumaru asked, “Any hint about why they might try to take you again?”

Miroku took a deep breath. “They know who I am.”

Inuyasha cursed behind him. “They know that you’re another Miroku?” Miroku nodded. “Shit! How the hell did they find out about that!”

“The ronin didn’t say.”

“Hell!”

“It is not a topic that has been discussed often.” Sesshoumaru said, visibly disturbed. “If Naraku has been spying on us closely enough to discover this, what else has he found out?”

“Shit, you think he knows about the well?” Kouga exclaimed, and Kagome leaned into him, holding his hand tightly.

“The ronin never mentioned it, but I doubt that means much.” Miroku said, trying to keep his mind solely on what information would be helpful.

“No, I’m afraid it doesn’t.” Sesshoumaru replied.

“I’ll have to get the wolves to start guarding the well now too, dammit.”

“Don’t be an idiot, Kouga,” Inuyasha said quickly. “If he knows about it, maybe that would stop any shit he might try, but what if he doesn’t? Guarding its the quickest way to let him know the well is something important.”

“Shit.” Kouga looked down at Kagome’s bent head, growling faintly. “What the hell are we supposed to do, then?”

“Kill the bastard as quickly as we can, same as always, and hope we get him before he screws us over too badly.” Inuyasha said coldly.

“Yeah, well, we could use a little fucking help, because frankly, we don’t seem to be doing so damn hot on finding him, let alone killing him!” Kouga snarled as he hugged Kagome tightly against him.

“Pay attention then! The ronin was taking Miroku to Naraku, so we know what direction he’s in now, dumbass!” Inuyasha paused and looked down and Miroku. “At least, that’s what I assume. Did – did the ronin say where he was taking you?”

Miroku nodded faintly, remembering. “He said Naraku had some questions for me.”

Inuyasha wrapped his arm around Miroku’s chest a moment and hugged him briefly. “Hey, it’s over now, okay? Naraku ain’t gonna get anywhere near you.”

“I know, Inuyasha. I’m fine.” He took a shaky breath, determined to make that the truth.

“Why would he wish to question Miroku?” Sesshoumaru asked, looking at the monk. “Yes, you are from another world, but what benefit would that hold for him?”

“I- I’ve been wondering that myself.” Miroku said, swallowing. “I think it may have to do with the other Naraku on my world. We managed to kill him, after all. I’ve been wondering if this Naraku wants to make sure he avoids the mistakes of his double from my world. ”

There was silence for a moment as they thought about the feasibility of that as the purpose behind Miroku’s abduction. “That would certainly explain the ronin’s reluctance to kill you.” Sesshoumaru said. “Naraku would be quite eager learn what led to his death.”

“You’d think he’d be just as keen to make sure we don’t know the same shit.” Kouga said. “Why would he take the risk that we’d find out? Why wouldn’t he just kill Miroku?”

“While we might obtain the information Miroku possesses if he lives, we might have discovered it on our own in any case. Questioning Miroku would likely make more sense to him than simply assassinating him.”

“So he’s gonna try for him again, then, isn’t he?” Inuyasha scowled.

“I don’t believe there’s any doubt, is there? And now that we know what he’s after, he won’t feel the need to hide his activities. He’ll come with more force.”

“So…if the little guy knows how to kill him, why doesn’t he just fucking tell US and then we WILL kill him. That’ll take care of the whole damn problem, won’t it?” Kouga asked belligerently, looking angrily at Miroku. “In fact, why the hell didn’t you tell us weeks ago, if you knew how to kill Naraku?”

Stricken, Miroku stared at him. “I-I never thought… So many things have been different, I never thought…”

“Fucking back off, Kouga!” Inuyasha growled. “It’s not like we fucking thought to ask, either! And it may not do a damn bit of good, because that may be one of the things that’s totally fucking different between the two places, just like the two Miroku’s!”

Kouga backed down, huffing under his breath. “Fine then. But can we at least know how you killed the fucker!”

Every eye focused on Miroku and he worked hard not to freeze up, concentrating on the hand still softly teasing his hair to calm himself. “Eh, well…I suppose the first thing to find out is if Naraku has removed his heart here?” He looked at the others in question.

“Removed his heart?” Sesshoumaru frowned.

“Yes, he could recover from almost anything as long as his heart remained hidden and undamaged.” Miroku said quietly.

“Well, it’s the first I’ve heard of something like that,” Kouga said, thinking. “But the bastard always seems to live, no matter what we do to him, so it might be the same. Where’d he hide it?”

“Eh, he hid it in the form of a small infant in my reality. I believe I could find where it was located.” Miroku said tentatively.

“That sounds fine.” Inuyasha said shortly. “We’ll figure out where to go later.” He continued stroking Miroku’s hair carefully, glaring at everyone to let them know that Miroku was close to done. He could feel how tense his little mate was as the conversation dragged on, especially when Miroku realized that he hadn’t passed on information that might be important. Okay, that had been pretty stupid on all their parts, but everybody made mistakes. It wasn’t like he’d done it on purpose or anything.

“Don’t worry, Miroku,” Kagome said, seeing for herself how unhappy Miroku was. “We’ll take care of Naraku and then there won’t be anything else to worry about.”

Inuyasha felt Miroku tense even more in his lap and he frowned. What was he worrying about?

“Miroku?” he said quietly. “Is there something you need to tell?”

Miroku’s scent started to tremble rather violently with fear and Inuyasha felt his own body start to respond, his hackles rising and his youkai pushing at him as it hunted for some sign of what was so upsetting the little monk.

“Is there anything more that we need to know about, Miroku?” Inuyasha asked again, watching him closely.

Miroku nodded after a small pause. “The ronin had a- a small sphere that he claimed was a piece of Naraku. It was…absorbing…a- a youkai that he was using. I didn’t know if you knew about a weapon like that?”

Inuyasha looked at him suspiciously. His scent hadn’t calmed in the slightest. He didn’t think that was what was bothering him.

“Oh yeah, we’ve seen that shit. A little black ball with those creepy little tentacles?” Kouga said from across the way. “Bastard already tried that once with us, but Kagome can purify that shit like it’s nothing. Never bothered with it again.”

“That’s- good to know. Hachi was in so much pain, I didn’t even want to think…”

“Hachi?”

“The youkai he used it on was the double of one I used to know.” Miroku close his eyes, trying not to grieve. “A tanuki. He was practically insane from the pain of it, I think.”

“Aah, so that’s what happened to the tanuki we scented.” Sesshoumaru asked, “I am sorry for your feelings of loss, Miroku, but I must admit that I’m glad the ronin has one less resource to draw on.”

“Sesshoumaru, don’t be an ass.” Inuyasha growled, reaching an arm around Miroku to embrace his chest again. Why was he still smelling so upset? What wasn’t he telling them? “Miroku, please…I can tell you’re really worried about something.” He said softly into his mate’s ear. “What’s wrong?”

He could feel Miroku start to shiver and he kept his arm around him, leaning his head on top of Miroku’s as he tried to make him feel as safe as possible. Gods, what had happened to him?

“I- I don’t know if my double will give up.” Miroku finally said, his voice wavering slightly.

Inuyasha looked over at the others to see if they understood what he meant. They looked as lost as he was.

“Give up?”

“On- on trying to…” Miroku took a shaky breath and cursed. “On trying to get to me.” He ended quietly, squirming uncomfortably.

“Why? “ Inuyasha asked, refusing to release him, still stroking his hair and keeping him close against his body.

“It’s only that… I believe he wanted me for… for other reasons than Naraku did.” Miroku whispered miserably.

Inuyasha’s youkai growled inside his head. The ronin still wanted Miroku? His beautiful little Miroku? There was no way in HELL that bastard was getting his hands on him. No fucking way in hell.

“Then we’ll just have to make sure we take him out too, that’s all.” Inuyasha said, his voice growling and his eye color fluctuating as he struggled for control.

“I agree.” Sesshoumaru said calmly, his eyes cold.

“Well shit, of course we will. Not gonna let that bastard hurt one of ours again!” Kouga said, nodding emphatically.

Miroku’s body relaxed within Inuyasha’s arms and the hanyou felt his youkai subside marginally. He just needed to keep him close so that Miroku felt safe from the damn ronin, that was all.

And if Miroku ever felt like talking about what happened, he had some damn good ears for listening.


Ronin Miroku stirred in his sleep.

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“Mushin!” the youthful voice echoed through the temple. “I found the mushrooms! Mushin!”

Miroku looked through the temple room by room, searching for his absent mentor.

“Mushin?” He walked out the door into the main courtyard and saw Mushin laying on his stomach at the bottom of the steps. “Mushin!!” Running down to him, he was terrified that Mushin had gotten so drunk that he’d fallen on the stairs. He’d already been halfway to passing out already when Miroku had gone out hunting for mushrooms. Why had he tried to walk down the stairs in that condition!

“Mushin, are you hurt?” he reached over with boyishly slim arms, struggling with the overweight man’s shoulders to turn him over. He froze as he was met with a bruised, battered face and eyes glassy with death. “Mushin?” he whimpered, and then screamed as he was grabbed from behind. Struggling against what felt like dozens of hands, he yelled out as he found himself face down next to his mentor, a man pinning each arm to the ground.

“You really are an idiot, boy.” He heard a harsh voice say from behind him. “A few minutes of pleasure with the Daimyo’s daughter isn’t worth angering that powerful of a lord. And now that he’s found out, well…” the voice and some of the men surrounding him chuckled, “he wants to ensure that you receive the proper punishment for your crime before you die.”

“Let me go!” He pleaded, voice high pitched with childish terror, “I’ll go away! I won’t say anything, please…”

The man grunted and spat on the ground next to his head.“Feh, you’re pathetic. Not even worth the loyalty that damn monk showed trying to save your sorry hide.” Miroku heard the rustle of clothing and felt cold hands pulling at his robes.

“Leave me alone! Don’t touch me! Leave me ALONE!!” He pulled desperately at the arms holding him as calloused hands touched him intimately.

Something large and hard tore into him and he screamed, hearing masculine laughter around him. He sobbed and screamed as the pain went on and on, mewling pitifully by the time the soldier finished with a heavy grunt.

“Damn, it’s been a hell of a long time since I was in something that tight.”

“Boys that age are always tight, you idiot. He’s gotta be, what, 12? 13?”

“Fucking good, is what he is. C’mon, whose next?”

Time blurred as one rape blended into the next until he lay in a stupor of agony, eyes staring almost as glassily as his deceased mentor. There was a pause, and one of the men kicked him onto his back as his arms were released.

He watched with blank eyes as one of his rapists drew his sword. He was going to die. His head flopped to the side, almost thankful to have it end, and he saw the pitiful bundle of robes laying on the ground behind the soldiers surrounding him. His eyes refocused and hardened.

These were the ones who’d killed Mushin.

He looked back up at the man above him.

“Die, you bastards.” He said, his voice barely a whisper of sound. He reached for his now unrestrained right hand and pulled off the beads. He held it steady as the samurai started to scream, until every last one disappeared and the only thing he heard was the fierce rushing of wind as his kazaana raged. Slowly wrapping the beads back around his hand, he lay still, staring up at the sky, blood seeping down his legs as he started to shiver.

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Ronin Miroku opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling.

“Well, I haven’t thought of that in a while.” He said quietly, shaking his head. He stood up, flexing his arms and back to check and see if he’d healed up enough from his beating to depart yet. It felt like it; the scabs were already firm and partially formed. Walking out of his alcove, he made his way across Naraku’s room to the where his clothes were hanging. Dressing slowly, he finished by donning his outer armor and attaching a small, blood covered pouch to it. He fed the fire until it was hot enough to boil water for his tea and set up a small pot for himself once the water was ready.

Walking back across the room for the tea leaves, his feet crushed large pieces of shattered mirror, breaking the shining pieces into miniscule, glittering fragments as he moved. Tea steeping, the ronin glanced around the room, cataloging. The bed was a loss. He’d never be able to get that large a blood stain out, nor did he feel any interest in trying. He would run into the same difficulty with the tatami mats at the foot of the bed. The knives were salvageable, however. He wasn’t sure why he hadn’t collected them the day before, now that he thought about it. Getting lazy in his old age, likely. He walked back over the shard-ridden floor to slide one stained throwing knife from the heart of a small, silver haired babe on the floor. The other he pulled out of the white haired girl who’d carried the heart of Naraku as long as the ronin could remember.

He didn’t bother with the nude, dark haired hanyou laying in a pool of his own blood . He’d had to use the knife that took the bastard’s head almost immediately afterwards on the babe. There was nothing of interest left on the bed for him. Thinking about it briefly, he supposed he should be pleased it had gone so smoothly. Naraku always did let down his guard after a little blood play and a really good fuck.

A very, very foolish thing to do.

Wiping down the blades, the ronin laid them next to him as he slowly drank his tea, reaching down a moment to pat the small, incomplete jewel in the pouch at his waist. Looking over at the bed, he raised his tea in a mocking salute. “You shouldn’t have decided to take the pretty.” He said softly. “Nobody takes what’s mine, Naraku. Not even you.” he turned back to the table and continued calmly sipping his tea.