Book of Loneliness by Demona Leigh

Prologue

Book of Loneliness

Prologue

Kagome spent three long years picking up the pieces of her life. It had been a pleasant distraction from the emptiness and loneliness that roiled deep inside her soul.

She'd reestablished her friendships, shallow as they were at times.

She'd gone to night school in order to finish the education that The Shikon no Tama had robbed from her.

Those had been the most prevalent and important things to her modern existence. Her life was woefully normal now. Kagome had no magic, no dog-eared hanyou rolling his eyes at something she did that he deemed ridiculous, no unbearably lovely youkai lord glowering at her from beneath a fringe of silver-white bangs.

Once more, she was just a mundane mortal girl, her time in the past feeling like little more than a schoolgirl's fantasy. In her darkest hours, Kagome wondered if it hadn't been all a dream--Until she thought of Naraku...of Kikyou...Surely she would never have dreamed of such things. Her mind had never been so cloaked in darkness at the age of fifteen.

It didn't matter anymore anyway.

Kagome was determined not to drown in her sorrow, wanted desperately not to be weak. It was in the back of her mind, curiously, that she did not want to disappoint Sessho-Maru.

She'd thought of him off and on throughout these lonely years. In her first year back in reality, she'd watched out for him. Eventually, she had given up, figuring if they were to meet again questing for him all over Tokyo would not bring him any quicker. Odds were that he wasn't even residing in this region.

Kagome wore her broken heart like a shroud, and though she had taken lovers and had had boyfriends, they never lasted. No one could compare to the memory of Inu-Yasha or was as maddeningly compelling as his brother.

When Ayumi, Eri, and Yuka had finally pried at the fate of her relationship with Inu-Yasha, Kagome had made up an appropriate lie. She had invented a story about a mugger and a switchblade so that they would not trash his name for "breaking up with her." Their admiration of his honour and bravery would have pleased and comforted her if it had not been for the suffocating irony in her story. How many times had she watched Inu-Yasha get run through the abdomen, by sword, by creepy tentacles, by his own brother's hand, and seen him grunt it off and keep going? Inu-Yasha would have never been killed by a mere stabbing wound, and yet according to her big, fat lie he had done just that.

Kagome held her memories of Sessho-Maru close to her. Though she'd long ago mentioned him in passing to her friends, she was tight-lipped about her time with him during those two months of recuperation. It wasn't as if she could really say anything; she was choking on her lies and she didn't want to ruin such an enlightening, strangely special experience with grey, colourless invention.

Sessho-Maru was beyond the mundane. He stood out in her mind in brilliant colour and shining light. She would always remember the day that they had stayed awake taking in the garden until dawn. The sun had painted fiery highlights in hair, had set him ablaze.

No...no stupid little lie would have described his beauty, his power.... Sessho-Maru was too large, beyond any human boundaries. Kagome did not know when she had begun to think of him in such a way.

When she thought of Inu-Yasha, her throat burned with loss. Could have...would have...should have...Never was.

When she thought of Sessho-Maru, her chest felt tight with hope. Kagome had long ago outgrown the dreams of a knight-in-shining armour, but she longed for a way out of this existence in which she moved about like a silent specter.

To be continued....