Traditions by Sayah1112

Alpha

Chapter Two: Alpha

Sesshoumaru stood, bathed in moonlight, on the edge of Inuyasha’s forest. He loses himself, briefly, in thought. Inuyasha, the half-brother he hated. Despised. Always considered inferior, weak even. But the whelp had proven him wrong, hadn’t he? He had mastered their father’s coveted blade, had gotten back up time and time again when he’d been knocked down. The half demon had an indomitable will, a fighter’s spirit. Despite the circumstances of his birth, despite the obstacles he faced, he had survived. Countless demons and evil humans lay dead by Inuyasha’s claws, his blade.

Sesshoumaru tilted his head to the side, an impatient snarl curling on his lip. Such thoughts were useless. The half breed who had survived so much, overcome so many obstacles, was dead. Cut down by a human fever.

A sickness.

There was no honor in such a death. Not after everything the whelp had been through, had fought for. Sesshoumaru had even come to respect him over the years.

And what does the stupid half breed do? He dies , following in his firstborn son’s footsteps.

Sesshoumaru could still clearly remember the day that Jaken had delivered the news, while a tearful Rin  stood wringing her hands in the doorway, begging him to save Inuyasha-san and Kenji-kun. At his ward’s behest, Sesshoumaru had left the comfort of his castle and headed toward the village that Rin had traveled from. The village that bordered Inuyasha’s forest.

By the time he arrived, Inuyasha and his whelp had been long dead. The miko that Inuyasha had taken to mate was burning with fever. It was only out of respect for all that the miko had done for the village and it’s people that villagers did not burn her body alongside her mate’s and pup’s.

The idiots. Out of fear of sickness, they had turned Inuyasha and the child’s corpses to ash. There would be no resurrection. No second chance. Not for the half breed, and not for his son.

Sesshoumaru remembered standing in the doorway of the small hut where Inuyasha and his mate had made their home. He remembered looking down on the miko, her face slicked with sweat, her head thrashing back and forth on the pallet. Her eyes were glazed when she opened them and Sesshoumaru could still recall the desperation in those blue orbs when they lit upon him. The hope. Sesshoumaru, for the first time in a long time, had felt his heart wrench inside of his chest.

“S-Save them. Sesshoumaru-sama…p-please.” The miko had whispered past her dry, bleeding, lips. Her hand raising, shaking and trembling, as she beseeched him. Asked him to do the impossible. She did not ask for herself. She did not care; he could see it in her eyes. Like a true Alpha female, she put the safety and wellbeing of her pack first. And it was all for naught.

She did not know. She did not know what the humans had done to her mate and child.

Sesshoumaru had stood in the doorway, temporarily captivated by the young woman at his feet. 

“There is nothing left to save, Miko. They are gone. Burned.” The words fell from his lips like heavy blades. Cold. Hard. Cutting.  He turned on his heel then, walking out of the hut that smelt of sweat and sickness. The cry that had gone up as he left would be one that would long haunt his dreams. It was not overly loud or shrill, but it was the sound of a human heart breaking, a soul shattering.

The miko had lost everything.

And Sesshoumaru had kept walking. Away from the noise, away from the miko and her broken heart. Why? Because she had stirred something within him, feelings of remorse, of compassion.

Compassion was a weakness. The feelings were uncomfortable. And despite what tradition dictated; that Sesshoumaru take his half-brother’s wife into his household, care for her, Sesshoumaru had simply walked away. For the first time in a long time, he had turned his back on tradition. She had made him feel and that had been unacceptable.

That was six years ago. Not at all that long for a demon, and one so long lived as the Lord of the Western lands, but for a human? It had been quite some time.  He would not even be here now, if not for Tenseiga. The blade had woken him out of a sound sleep.  He dreamt, as he did every time he closed his eyes, of pale blue orbs awash with tears. Of desperation, of love. He dreamt of her. The miko, the yin to his demon yang. He saw her as she was that day, sick with fever and worry.

 But then, for the first time in six years, the dream had changed. Morphed.

He didn’t see a sickly miko any longer. Instead he saw the girl, young and vibrant. Her head thrown back on a laugh, love and mirth shining in her blue eyes as a wide smile stretched across her plump lips. He saw her running before him, her eyes crinkling at the corners as she turned around to call out his name, her long ink black hair shooting out behind her. He knew, without actually knowing, that her skin was like silk, the taste of her lips as sweet as honey, and her passion, her love, burned hot.

And then Inuyasha stood before him, arms crossed over his chest, that perpetual frown on his lips.

“These are my memories, Sesshoumaru. This is the woman that I loved.  This is how I see her, how I’ve always seen her. You have to save her. She was supposed to be safe with you. You were supposed to take care of her. She doesn’t deserve this,”  Inuyasha swallowed thickly before his gaze again sought Sesshoumaru’s. “Take her. Mate her. She is a worthy female. Any children you sire on her will be strong, powerful. Just…don’t let her die.”

And then Sesshoumaru had been ripped from the dream by the insistent pulsing of Tenseiga. Without conscious thought, Sesshoumaru had followed instinct, allowing his father’s blade to lead him where it would. And of course the insufferable sword had led him back here. To this place. To these memories.

Mentally scoffing at his own folly, Sesshoumaru turned his back on the forest. His intent? To leave. He cared not what purpose the blade had, nor why his dead half-brother had come to visit in a dream. The miko, the woman, the human was not his concern.  She never had been, and she never would be.

He made it about three steps before his superior nose picked up a most disturbing scent.

Blood. Her blood.

For a moment Sesshoumaru stood, rooted to the spot. His desire to leave was strong. He knew, suddenly and without any doubt, why the sword had led him here. He knew what it wanted from him. No emotion dared cross the stoic planes of his face, and yet Sesshoumaru was fighting a fierce inner battle. He did not want to follow that scent. He did not want to see where it led. He knew what he would find. It would be…uncomfortable, to say the least.

Coward. His beast hissed, speaking to him for the first time in six years. You run away? Scared? It taunted him cruelly, lashing out at his pride.

Sesshoumaru growled, the sound was low and gravelly, a warning.

“This Sesshoumaru is no coward.”

Aren’t you?  His beast countered. You run from her. She is ours.

 Briefly, Sesshoumaru closed his eyes against the primal heat and onslaught that his beast was rallying within him.

Save her. Mark her. Mount her. Claim her. She is OURS.

Despite his best efforts, he felt his canines begin to elongate, his lips curl back as his eyes began to bleed red in the corners. He could, it seemed, no longer fight it. He had put this meeting off for as long as he could. It was time to face it, face her, and face the consequences of his neglect.

It did not take long for the demon lord to find her. She was where he knew she would be, by Goshinbiki, the tree of ages.

 She lay prone at it’s base, her arms outspread in a gesture of surrender. She was bathed in the iridescent light from the full moon above, her head canted to the side and an expression of peace written across her face. She was still young for a human. Too young, perhaps, to lose so much and then be left bereft.  Alone in her grief.

And yet she looked for all the world as if she was simply sleeping. The coopery smell of blood in the air, however, belied such a sweet expression. How much had the miko suffered in order to have such a countenance? Was death really that preferable to life?

“She is weak.” Sesshoumaru’s voice was cold, hard. His golden eyes bore down upon the prone form at his feet, his hand resting on the hilt of Tensiega. Reluctantance in the hard line of his jaw, the tenseness in his shoulders.

She is strong. The beast countered.  No mate to protect her, no pups to live for.

“She is a coward.” Sesshoumaru snarled, his eyes hard and flinty. He hated this. Hated the ache in his chest at the sight of the miko blood spilled on the ground.  He felt guilt. And he did not like it.

Many would have followed their mate long before this.  The beast growled back, rearing up inside him. You know this to be true. The only coward here is you.

Sesshoumaru growled, his hand tightening around the hilt of Tenseiga. In a fluid movement he drew the blade. Demons of the underworld became visible to his sharp gaze, their chains thrown across the body of the miko.

Sesshoumaru knew what would happen if he revived her. He knew what needed to be done, what should have been done all those years ago. And he also knew that she would hate him for it. She would fight him, despise him. But in the end? She would submit.

Because he was her Alpha, and he would have it no other way.

In one swing he sliced through the little beasts that crawled over his miko, severing the chains that were trying to drag her soul down to the underworld.

Sheathing Tenseiga he approached the prone form of the miko, a snarl twisting across his lips. He hated her for doing this to him, for forcing his hand like this. There would be no going back now.  He took a knee next to her as her body began to heal before his eyes. The wounds at her wrists sealing up, closing. With ease, he scooped her up into his arms, one hand weaving through the soft silk of her hair.

And then he heard it.

The first beat of her heart.

Lub-dub

His beast howled in victory at the sound of her first indrawn breath. Her gasp as her eyelids fluttered open, those long sooty black lashes spiky with tears. She reached a hand up toward him, her fingers fisting in the silk of his haori.

“Inu-Inuyasha?”

He growled at the sound of his half brother’s name on her lips. His hand fisted in her hair, baring her neck and her pulse to his gaze.

“Mine.”  He growled, fangs erupting past his lips as he lowered his head to her neck. He gave her no time to fight him, no time for tears or arguments. Instead, he bit down hard on her neck, his fangs slicing through the tender flesh as he replaced the old mark there with his own. He knew the moment that she realized what he had done, for she grew stiff in his arms.

Ignoring the scream of denial that left her lips, he rose to his feet, the miko still cradled in his arms.

“You are mine now.” Seshoumaru growled, his red eyed looking down at the tearful miko in his arms. Her hand was raised to her neck, the fingers tracing over the bloody wound of his mark. A mark that would tie her to him until his death. Prolong her life. A mark that claimed her as his mate.

He ignored the scent of her tears, the soft pleading wails that spiraled down into cries, then whimpers. He was taking the miko home. He was fulfilling his duty as Alpha. Following tradition. Soon he would have her.  She would be under him, his bitch, by this time tomorrow night.

A/N: I have never updated this quickly before XP Probably because the first chapter was so freaking short. Enjoy! Let me know if you liked it, or if you hated it and why! TTFN