Hanyou Times Two

A/N Well, this took me a hell of a long time. Sorry about that. I’m hoping to finish it off within a couple of chapter, in a much shorter time than it took to get here. I’d have made this one longer, but frankly, right now I have a concussion and so I'm just stopping with what I have. It's short and poorly edited, but it's going up, 'cause you've waited long enough. Take care and have a nice weekend - hopefully the rest will come soon.


Chapter 6 – in the doghouse

Miroku looked at the back of Inuyasha and wished he were anywhere else. Watching Inuyasha’s ass while they walked was, to put the best face on it, not entertaining at all. A male ass in red clothing was a far cry from the appealing curves of female hips in tight-fitting black. And the way Inuyasha walked! He stomped and grumbled, his arms swinging about – there was no way it could be mistaken for the graceful, swaying stride that Miroku would much rather be watching.

Not even if he squinted and crossed his eyes to blur the image.

The only good thing about having the hanyou ahead of him was that Inuyasha was upwind, and he smelled like sweaty dog-demon. Nothing killed an erection faster than smelling that. So that was good. Not smelling vanilla and cherries and bitter almonds was….good. His cock wasn’t aching and his hands had no urge to grab anything. That was good.

Miroku sighed as he continued walking.

He never thought he’d miss the smell of vanilla so damn much.

Turning his head, he peered behind him, searching out the woman whose smell had been haunting him ever since he’d changed. The wind was blowing the wrong way to catch her scent, but at least he could see her. And her ferocious scowl as she caught him looking, so he turned back and looked at the less frightening trail ahead of them. His ears flicked back to listen for the sound of hiraikotsu, just in case.

The girls had refused to travel any further with either of them since they day they were bitten, two night before. Unless the two males took the lead when they traveled, they’d claimed they wouldn’t even travel with them anymore. He wasn’t so sure of that – they’d been together so long, surely they wouldn’t simply abandon them for one, small thing? But when he’d argued the point with Inuyasha, his friend had pounded on his head so hard that he’d agreed just to keep his brains where they were supposed to be.

So for two days now, he and Inuyasha had trooped ahead of the group on the trail, Inuyasha insisting on being first. Eyeing the men with suspicion and equally angry stares all day long, the women had sat next to each other, walked next to each other, even slept next to each other! And they wouldn’t say a single word to Inuyasha or himself - they sent over Shippou with messages rather than talk to them. It was like living in a small armed camp, where he and Inuyasha were the invaders.

With lice, bad breath, and dirt under their nails - at least that’s what one would think from their behavior.

He’d been treated like a pariah before, but this was above and beyond, especially when he was accused, and convicted, of doing something he’d never done. Usually, at least he’d participated in the theft or seduction that he was paying for. At least that way he’d gotten something out of it.

He was getting really tired of this, he thought, stabbing the ground with his staff particularly hard. Sango and he were stuck together; the mating had worked. He and Inuyasha had compared notes, and neither of them had any doubt about it. The signs were there. There was something about Sango’s smell, something that reminded him of himself whenever it hit his nose, and Kagome’s made him think of Inuyasha. It didn’t seem to smell any different, but somehow, it still brought the images to mind. Considering Inuyasha experienced the same sensation, that was conclusive enough for both of them.

Although of course it made Miroku curious as to why it was happening. Inuyasha thought it was a protective device, so you didn’t fuck with someone else’s mate. Miroku just knew that it made it clear he’d have to talk to Sango sometime soon or they were never going to solve this, and Inuyahsa and Kagome were going to have to do the same.

Ignoring each other and talking through Shippou might make the women feel better, but it wasn’t going to solve the problem.

And it was making him feel like shit besides, which he really didn’t enjoy feeling. He wanted to be able to feel like a normal man – hanyou- again and not like someone who was carrying the plague

“I am not a damn rapist,” he muttered.

“I heard you the firs billion times, lech. I know you’re not a rapist, Shippou knows your not a rapist, the damn bees know you’re not a rapists. So shut the hell up about it already, because we don’t care!”

Inuyasha’s eyes looked shadowed as he glared back at him, much worse that Miroku looked, he was sure. His friend was nearly crushed by Kagome’s continued rejection of him, and so far, neither of them had been able to get the girls to listen to what they were trying to say.

The girls didn’t know they had mates now. They didn’t know they were stuck with them forever, and they didn’t know that it would be in their best interested to kiss and make up, especially the kissing part. That should be without question – lots of the kissing part. A box full of kisses would do for all of them right now.

Make up kisses. And he didn’t care if he was trying to make up or Sango was, he just wanted the kissing.

Miroku felt his cock twitching and groaned under his breath. Inuyasha’s smell should was supposed to take care of that. Like an erection preventative. Miroku’s mind couldn’t possibly be so lecherous that the mere thought of kissing Sango could…

… that would be so wonderful, wouldn’t it? She had the firmest lips, just that little bit plump. Like the globes of her ass with that muscled roundness that was so perfect if you cupped your hands just so and-

“Ow!” Miroku rubbed his face where it had just run into Inuyasha’s back.

“Shut up, idiot!” Inuyasha hissed. The hanyou’s ears were twitching wildly as he sniffed the air. “You smell that?”

Miroku sniffed tentatively and wrinkled his nose at the stench that hit it. “What the hell is that?” he whispered back.

“Naraku.”

Naraku? It smelled like 1000 year old rot that had been left in the sun and drowned in a cesspool. No wonder Inuyasha always said he could recognize his stench. Who would ever be able to forget this!

“It’s not him – it’s too spread out – it’s gotta be something working for him. Warn the girls.”

“Huh? Why should I have to?! They won’t even speak to me, and you know it.”

Inuyasha turned to glare at him and Miroku stepped back. There was the barest hint of red in his eyes.

“Monk, I’m not fucking around here. The smell shouldn’t be this strong. Whatever it is smells huge, so either we’re getting’ one hell of a youkai surprise, or a whole hell of a lot of them. We gotta deal with this and figure out all the other…shit…later. And you get to do it because you can’t use your nose good yet. You got something jumping out at you, it ain’t gonna help you to smell them because you’re pathetic at tellin’ direction with it. So suck it up and go tell the women!”

Miroku nodded and turned around. He could feel his back twitching. Inuyasha might be irritating, but it was rare that he got this upset over something. Grumpy as hell, yes, but he seemed genuinely worried, and that was something else altogether. With a couple bounds, Miroku landed in front of the women and ducked as Sango swung out her hiraikotsu at his head before he could open his mouth.

“Dammit, Sango! I am not going to attack you!”

“That’s just what you’re doing now!” She retorted, swinging at him again.

He jumped over it and growled at her before she could do it again. “Naraku’s up to something.”

The swings stopped and Sango stepped back. Kagome was already getting her arrows out and Kirara transformed before Miroku could draw breath again.

“What?” Sango asked, readying her weapon. Miroku noticed grumpily that she didn’t even apologize for thinking he had nefarious intentions. But then again, she was stubborn like that. Maybe some day he could get her under him and kiss her belly until she said she was sorry…

“Houshi, what’s going on with Naraku?” Sango barked and broke him from his reverie.

“Eh…Inuyasha wasn’t sure. But he said it smelled like something very large, or numerous. I think we should be extremely careful about this or we could be in trouble. So stay focused. He went on to see what he could find.”

The women had to be content with that and Miroku turned to lead the way down the path. There was a bend in the road where it went into the nearby forest. They all slowed as they entered. The scent was very strong here, and he told them as much. Inuyasha was nowhere to be seen, and there wasn’t a sound of him up ahead.

But there wasn’t anything else either. The birds were silent, the insects quiet, and the only sounds that Miroku could pick up were the sounds of their feet scuffling on the dirt path. Miroku thought that maybe he could make out the sound of a stream a long way to the east, but that worried him more.

If he was actually hearing something far away, why wasn’t he hearing Inuyasha? The hanyou should be a clear as a bell. And so should whatever was from Naraku. It made him so tense he knew his ears were twitching, and it brought to mind all the times the rest of them would use Inuyasha’s ears to figure out what he was feeling. He wished he didn’t have the same give away, but he couldn’t stop it. Where the hell was that damned, irritating, red clad hanyou? And what was going on?

“I can’t hear Inuyasha anywhere,” he whispered quietly.

Kagome sucked in a stuttering breath. “I-I’m sure he’s fine,” she said softly. Miroku could hear the quaver in her voice and a few things clarified within his head. Their battles with Naraku had been growing increasingly more difficult, with more than one of them often injured by the end, sometimes severely.

And his wind tunnel had been getting bigger lately. He hadn’t used it since he’d turned hanyou, so perhaps his new constitution might grant him more time before his kazaana consumed him, but it was getting closer.

Every time he had to use it now, he ran the risk of it breaking loose. It had been that way for months, every time feeling like he was gambling with his life on the next moment as it opened and expanded, just slightly. If this was the end, he didn’t want to die with this trouble between him and Sango.

“Sango,” he said softly. He didn’t turn around, although he could tell she heard him. “You know I wasn’t trying to attack you, don’t you?”

Sango grumbled under her breath, but he could practically feel the serious worry laying itself over her own mind as well. “I don’t know what you were doing, houshi. It certainly felt like being attacked. And neither you nor Inuyasha have offered any other explanation, so what –“

“You haven’t let us get near enough to try,” he shot back. “This isn’t something I’m going to relay through Shippou!”

It was quiet behind him for a moment.

“All right, then. I’m listening now.”

Miroku glanced back at her, saw she was serious, and turned around again. “We can’t talk about this now! I was just checking to see…I didn’t want you to think something that wasn’t true, that’s all that I was concerned with. It’s a terrible time to have an involved discussion with you, Sango.”

“I disagree. I think it’s the perfect time to talk about this. You have to concentrate on what’s around us, and where Naraku might be, and that means that you can’t focus so much on lying. This might be the only way I get an honest answer from you.”

“Now that hurts, Sango. What have I ever done to make you think I wouldn’t give an honest answer?”

“We don’t have time to list them all. I mean it, Miroku. You can tell me right now. I don’t know if I want to listen if you feel like you need to focus on lying just to tell me.”

Miroku cursed in his head. Scanning the woods, still trying to figure out where Inuyasha’s scent was leading them, or where his hanyou friend actually was, he didn’t want to talk about this right now.

But he was going to be stuck with Sango for a long time.

And her scent was vanilla and jasmine now – very strong. Looking back at her calm looking face, it was strange to realize how upset she actually was. He didn’t think he’d be telling her any time soon just how much her scent was giving away. But right now, damn, this was going to be hard.

Walking ahead, he took a deep breath. How to go about letting her know everything?

“Eh, well, Sango, you see…” Was that a branch cracking? Miroku turned his head as he kept talking quickly. “The problem was that you and Kagome smell.”

“What?”

Miroku winced at the loud screech and flattened his ears. That hadn’t come out right at all.

“I didn’t mean it like that!” He ducked his head as he walked, just in case there was a hiraikotsu swing with his name on it. “It’s a good smell!”

Nothing slammed into his head and Miroku started to relax until he heard Kagome’s tentative question. Damn, he hadn’t been thinking about her hearing as well. His mind was really not focusing right now.

“We smell nice?”

He nodded, moving his head back and forth while he tried to concentrate on what he was sensing around them. Something felt…oppressive. A demonic aura in…the west. Miroku took the fork in the path that headed the right direction.

“Yes.” He inhaled and Sango’s scent wrapped around his entire body like it was blocking out the horrible Naraku stench. “Very nice,” he murmured.

Something new hit his nose, the familiar vanilla with something unexpected – strawberry. It distracted him so much he had to glance back again. And saw her blushing slightly. He felt his whole body respond. She might be angry at him lately, but a few words and she was blushing. That had to be a good sign. She was so beautiful, flushed and sweet and –

And looking behind him with surprised eyes as she obviously noticed something. He whipped around, staring, and for the first time he realized that the shadow lying across their path far down the trail was no such thing. It was a pit. The dank smell was just reaching his nose, along with Inuyasha’s.

From the pit.

Damn. He hated going underground.

Sango started walking down the trail towards it and he stepped aside and kept pace. She glanced at him.

“So, you can’t control yourself when you smell something good, is that it? So you attacked me?”

“I didn’t attack you!!” With a scowl, Miroku clenched his fists and started trying to think of a way to explain it in the few minutes they had before they got to the pit.

“Well, he couldn’t control himself when he couldn’t smell, so it’s not like it’s a surprise,” Shippou muttered.

Kagome chuckled and Sango smiled before she firmed her lips.

“I had perfect control before I changed, I’ll have you know!”

Sango’s eyes narrowed. “So, you meant to grope me every time you did it, is that it?”

His ears flattened as he realized what he’d said. “Eh, that’s not what I meant. I only meant that… Well, you see…”

“Yes?” She stared at him, in a way that he knew would have her tapping her foot if they’d been standing still, and he cursed again.

They needed to get to the damn underground crevice before he dug his own grave.